Legislation -
Referred to Committee
(Senate)
-
Oct. 2, 2008

Vote Result

Yea Votes

Nay Votes

Vote to pass a bill that sets limits intended to reduce the occurrences of price manipulation and "excessive" speculation in the energy and agriculture commodities markets.

Highlights:

Limits off-shore trading by prohibiting foreign boards of trade from providing their members in the U.S. with direct access to an electronic trading and order matching system in order to settle against the price of one or more contracts dealing with energy or agricultural commodities listed for trading (Sec. 4).

Provides an exception if the foreign board of trade meets certain specifications including making all information public each day and having authority to prevent or reduce threats of price manipulation and "excessive" speculation (Sec. 4).

Requires the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to set limits on the number of securities investments that may be held by any person in an effort to prevent "excessive" speculation, deter and prevent market manipulation, squeezes, and corners, ensure sufficient market liquidity for bona fide hedgers, and ensure that the price discovery function of the underlying market is not disrupted (Sec. 8).

Requires the CFTC to hire an additional 100 full-time employees with the intent of increasing public transparency of operations in the agriculture and energy markets and to improve enforcement of rules set out in this act (Sec. 10).

Requires the CFTC to issue a rule defining and classifying index traders and swap dealers in order to set reporting requirements for those entities (Sec. 6).

Requires routine reporting on at least a monthly basis of over-the-counter trading of agricultural or energy commodities that is interchangeable with trading in accordance with the rules of any board of trade or electronic trading facility, and allows the CFTC to impose position limits if it finds that this trading could cause a severe market disturbance (Sec. 14).